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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27328105">'Til Death Do Us Part</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheChainLink/pseuds/TheChainLink'>TheChainLink</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Original Work</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Dr X has built a creature, Genderswap, Mad Science, Pulp Science Fiction, Science Fiction/Double Feature, Some Explicit Language, The Bride of Frankenstein - Freeform</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-11-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-11-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 22:47:49</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,694</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27328105</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheChainLink/pseuds/TheChainLink</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>You want to live? Don't hold your breath.</p><p>This isn't life. It's living death...</p>
            </div></td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>'Til Death Do Us Part</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This is one of my older ones. It gets a little weird.</p><p>You have been warned.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>First, there was nothing. No sights, no sounds, no thoughts.</p><p>But then, through the nothingness, there was a voice:</p><p>
  <em>“Maaarrrrrkkkkkkk”</em>
</p><p>
  <em>“Maaaaarrrrrrrkkkkkkkkk”</em>
</p><p>The voice was distant, barely audible, but it was there.</p><p>Then all of a sudden there was…something: blurry images before his vision, like the mismatched fragments of a faded dream.</p><p>Then the images were gone; covered by a black veil hiding them from view.</p><p>But the voice remained, patiently growing in strength.</p><p>
  <em>“Waaaaayyyyyyyyy kkkkkkuuuuuuupppp”</em>
</p><p> </p><p>Then, without warning:</p><p>‘WAKE UP! <em>PLEASE!'</em></p><p>Mark’s eyelids fluttered open, and he found himself staring upwards at a tall, dark ceiling adorned with distant lights. He realised that this was the image from his dream made crystal-clear, like a camera coming into focus.</p><p>Another light flared into life, bigger than all the others and blindingly bright. He raised a hand to cover his eyes, and the voice rang out again, soft and feminine:</p><p><em>‘You’re alive!</em> Thank God!’ cried the voice. A huge dark shape blocked out the light, batted his hand away, and suddenly something was pressing against his lips, soft and warm. It held him for about thirty seconds before pulling away, gasping for breath. The blinding light was switched off, and he found himself face-to-face with a beautiful young woman with red-wine hair tied back into a ponytail. Mark searched for her name and found it:</p><p>‘Liz?’</p><p>The woman smiled. ‘Hello Mark.’ She said, kissing him again. ‘Welcome back.’</p><p>
  <em>Welcome back?</em>
</p><p>‘Liz, would you mind explaining what the hell is going on here?’</p><p>She paused. ‘Mark, what’s the last thing you can remember?’ she asked.</p><p>Mark thought long and hard. He remembered sitting in a house – <em>Liz’s</em> house, he recalled – late at night. The lights had been dimmed, the curtains had been drawn and there had been a black-and-white horror movie on TV. They’d watched it together, snuggled in each other’s warmth as chaos unfolded on the screen.</p><p>Then there was a gap. He had started the drive home on what might have been the same night. His vision had been consumed by a blinding white light, and that was where the memory stopped.</p><p>Mark told this to Liz, who simply stood there, shaking her head with what seemed to be a strange kind of wonder. ‘You really don’t remember, do you?’</p><p>‘What is there to remember?’ Mark yelled, suddenly frustrated. He didn’t understand any of this; the memories, the amnesia, the weird location, none of it made sense! ‘Just what the hell happened?’</p><p>Liz took a deep breath. She looked like she was debating with herself about something, but before Mark could ask her what she spoke again:</p><p>‘Do you think you can sit up?’ she asked.</p><p>Mark tried to move, and with some effort and Liz’s help he was able to prop himself up on his hands. He saw that he was dressed in what looked like a blue boiler suit, and finally got a better look at his surroundings:</p><p>They were in the middle of a massive, gothic-looking room, surrounded by tables and rolling carts stacked with scientific equipment. In the corner was a flight of steps that led down into darkness too deep for the lights to penetrate. It looked like the set of an old horror movie.</p><p>Liz took another deep breath and placed a hand on Mark’s shoulder to get his attention. ‘Listen,’ She said. ‘There’s no easy way to say this, so I’m just going to show you.’ She tightened her grip on his shoulder. ‘Are you ready?’</p><p>Mark sighed. ‘I guess I’m ready as I’ll ever be.’ He said.</p><p>Liz reached over, took hold of the boiler suit’s zipper and pulled it down, exposing his torso down to the waist.</p><p>Mark’s heart skipped a beat.</p><p>His skin was deathly-pale and covered with thick, uneven stitches. Patchy, rust-coloured stains surrounded them, and Mark realised that it was the remains of dried blood. Dotted across his skin were mismatched patches of flesh surrounded by similar stitches.</p><p>Mark turned back to Liz, horrified. ‘What happened to me?’ he demanded, and for the first time he saw the blood on her clothes.<em> ‘What did you do?’</em></p><p>Liz’s face darkened. She shoved him back down onto the table. Caught off guard, Mark yelled in pain as his back struck the hard metal surface.</p><p>‘You ungrateful little shit.’ Liz said. Mark was silenced from sheer shock. ‘You really don’t remember.’ She echoed, shaking her head again, this time in contempt rather than wonder. ‘I guess that crash damaged more than your body.’</p><p>‘What-‘</p><p>Liz rolled her eyes. ‘Oh, for the love of… you were in a car crash!’ she barked, silencing him again. ‘Some guy in a pickup truck hit your car head-on. You were flung through the windscreen and cut nearly in half. You didn’t stand a chance.’</p><p>‘You mean I <em>died?’</em></p><p><em>‘Yes, you died!’</em> she yelled. Her voice cracked on the final word, and she took a moment to steady herself before continuing. ‘You’d barely gotten down the road. By the time I got there, the truck driver had taken off and I was left to pick up the pieces. Literally. All I had to do was put you back together.’ Liz let a grin spread across her face. ‘I guess it was some kind of punishment for you leaving me like you did.’</p><p>And just like that, it all came flooding back:</p><p>
  <em>He was in Liz’s house again, still watching the movie on her TV. The film was reaching its climax; the black-and-white detective was descending the steps into a boiler room, revolver at the ready. The boiler flickered into life, casting light on several corpses hanging by their necks from the ceiling. The camera crash-zoomed in on his horrified face, and then there was a scream; long, strangled and clear – far too clear to have come from the television.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Mark nearly jumped out of his seat. ‘What the hell was that?’ he said, too shocked to raise his voice.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Liz cast a worried glance over her shoulder. The movement took little more than a second, but Mark missed nothing. ‘It was the movie!’ She said hastily. ‘It’s fine!’</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Mark shook his head, wide-eyed. ‘No, there is no way in hell that that was the movie.’ He said. He pointed behind them. ‘It came from back there!’</em>
</p><p>
  <em>‘I’m telling you, it was the movie!’ Liz insisted.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>The scream rang out again, louder and longer this time. ‘It’s coming from the basement.’ Mark said.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Mark got up and headed over to the staircase. Beneath it was a large trapdoor that lay flush with the floor, to the point where he could’ve missed it if not for its iron handle. He took hold of it and pulled the trapdoor open, exposing a flight of gnarled wooden steps descending into darkness.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>‘Mark?’</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Mark turned to face Liz, who was looking over from the sofa.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>‘Please just leave it.’ She pleaded. ‘I’ll tell you anything you want, answer any of your questions, just please don’t go down there.’</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Mark held her gaze for what felt like an eternity. But then he threw the trapdoor open all the way and it landed on the ground with a bang. As if on cue, there came yet another scream from below, and Mark made his way down the basement steps.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>He reached the bottom. He felt along the wall for a light switch, found it and flipped it on.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>What Mark saw made his blood run cold.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>On a makeshift table surrounded by medical equipment lay the upper half of a body. It was missing one arm, covered in blood… and somehow still alive.</em>
</p><p>The memory ended. Liz placed a hand on Mark’s chest, lightly pinning him down as she loomed over him.</p><p>‘You started asking all of these questions, and I knew I couldn’t let you leave. So I followed you.’ She said, grinning. ‘Lucky for me, your little getaway had already been taken care of.’</p><p>‘You’re insane.’ Was all that Mark could say. ‘You’re <em>insane.’</em></p><p>Liz shook her head, an almost amused grin on her face. ‘I’m not insane, Mark. I have a gift. I have the power to make <em>life.’</em> She leaned in towards him, until their faces were mere inches apart. ‘And if I did it once, then I can do it again.’</p><p>Mark saw his chance; he headbutted Liz, hitting her squarely in the nose for maximum impact. Liz cried out in pain and Mark shoved her away, sending her reeling back and knocking over the nearest rolling cart. Mark leapt off the table… and felt a sudden, sharp pain in his left calf. His entire body went limp, and he collapsed to the floor. He landed painfully on the cold hard surface, and he saw Liz getting to her feet, wiping blood from her nose. She had a now-empty syringe in her left hand, and some patches of neon-green residue were visible on the inside of the tube.</p><p>She stalked towards him, fire in her eyes. Mark tried to move, even just a little bit, but his body wouldn’t obey him. She closed the few feet between them, threw the syringe aside and drove a sharp kick into his ribs. Mark’s body erupted in pain, and he let out a long, ragged scream.</p><p><em>‘You ungrateful little fucker!’</em> she hissed. ‘I bring you back to life and<em> this</em> is how you repay me?!’</p><p>Mark tried to speak, but his tongue lay useless on the floor of his mouth. Fortunately, Liz seemed to be calming down. Darkness began to cloud the edges of his vision, and he had to fight to stay conscious.</p><p>‘I see.’ She said simply. ‘If I have to find other ways to make you cooperate, then so be it. I’ve given you a sedative; strong enough to knock you out for at least three hours. That should give you some time to think things over.’</p><p>As Mark’s vision began to fade, Liz bent down to his level. He vaguely noted the blood drying on her upper lip.</p><p>‘Remember Mark,’ she said, ‘I gave you life, <em>and I can take it away.’</em></p><p>Then the darkness overtook him, and he blacked out.</p>
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